Alright hoping somebody has seen this before and it isnt as catostrophic as it looks. I have a 2004 era 277B. Installed a new cat long block motor about 500hours ago. Machine is used with a snowblower typically and has been good. We have been having alot of cold temps for WA and a lot of dry snow. Machine apparently had something freeze and over pressurize the crankcase. This caused the oil fill cap on valve cover to come off and a lot of oil to get spilled inside of engine compartment. Crew added oil and got machine to a safe parking space. Now the dipstick is stuck and I am not willing to restart until I can verify oil level. I was able to get the dipstick out about 6 inches and can slide it back and forth now. Any ideas on what it could be stuck on and what to do next? It feels like it is going to shear if I apply much more force. Is it possible for the oil pump to come apart and some how capture the end of dipstick? Im aware of TIBU 4332 and it seems like that update would have been done in 18 years and most likely on the new longblock. Any ideas? More snow coming and need this thing running! Thanks in advance!
It was probably your crankcase breather that froze up, and the same condensation got froze in the dipstick tube. Heat the tube up and see, then figure out why there's so much water in the blowby.
Is it the crankcase breather that ties in with dipstick tube? Another identical machine in area, that my friend owns, has pushed out the dipstick resulting in oily mess. I will definitely be learning more about this system. When this happened, our temps reached -10f overnight, and employee at resort we maintain, stole our extension cord. We plugged it in for a couple hours and ran it. Definitely some serious moisture accumulating in breather system. I wonder if Im getting powder snow ingestion somehow. I know from snowmobiles that when its dry enough snow, it can get in anything that isnt well sealed.
Nothing to do with your dipstick issue but with ambient temperatures that low and blowing powder snow, do you block off the radiator grille almost completely when operating specifically in order to keep the coolant temperatures (and those of the rest of the engine in general) up.? Be aware that if you use cardboard or similar, whatever hole you put in it needs to be centred with the fan to avoid putting twisting loads on the fan blades as they spin. You may find that you can block off over 90% of the radiator area in order to get temperatures up to a "normal" level.
Never even thought of it honestly. However that would probably help with heater function and powder snow buildup in engine compartment as well. I have rolled UMHW I can build something with. Its super rare for us to see these kind of temps! We usually are fighting slush snow jamming the shoot not these issues! Thanks
This thread might give you some ideas. HeavyEquipmentForums
The vent freezing up is something that happens randomly during a short time when it's warming up that the water is vaporized but the outside hoses are still cold. Once it's frozen shut, the crankcase breather won't get warm with more air moving outside and no air moving inside. On a skid steer, blocking the radiator will warm up the engine real well, so that's probably fine as long as you watch the temp gauge, or have an alarm that works. I don't think it's ingesting snow to make the moisture in the crankcase, it's all normal combustion products, just not venting fast enough or possibly too much blowby and oil foam causing the vent freezing, but usually random.
Should definitely have that radiator covered up to some degree. You need to keep some heat in. Things are just too cold and that moisture is just turning to ice. Just keep an eye on engine/hydraulic temperatures, you can overheat if you cover up too much of the cooling package.
Well, unfortunately my frozen crankcase vent issue is turning out to be more serious. Compression test tomorrow will tell us more but it seems to be running on 3 at best. Super rough at idle, wont rev up, and lacking power. Dipstick still wont come out. Seems like it is severely bent not frozen. Must have made contact with a rod or ?? I will report back once I know more.